US Military Makes First Confirmed OpenAI Purchase For War-Fighting Forces (theintercept.com)
- Reference: 0175362893
- News link: https://tech.slashdot.org/story/24/10/30/2042249/us-military-makes-first-confirmed-openai-purchase-for-war-fighting-forces
- Source link: https://theintercept.com/2024/10/25/africom-microsoft-openai-military/
> Less than a year after OpenAI quietly signaled it wanted to do business with the Pentagon, a procurement document obtained by The Intercept shows U.S. Africa Command, or AFRICOM, believes access to OpenAI's technology is "essential" for its mission. The [1]September 30 document lays out AFRICOM's rationale for buying cloud computing services directly from Microsoft as part of its $9 billion Joint Warfighting Cloud Capability contract, rather than seeking another provider on the open market. "The USAFRICOM operates in a dynamic and evolving environment where IT plays a critical role in achieving mission objectives," the document reads, including "its vital mission in support of our African Mission Partners [and] USAFRICOM joint exercises."
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> The document, labeled Controlled Unclassified Information, is marked as FEDCON, indicating it is not meant to be distributed beyond government or contractors. It shows AFRICOM's request was approved by the Defense Information Systems Agency. While the price of the purchase is redacted, the approval document notes its value is less than $15 million. Like the rest of the Department of Defense, AFRICOM -- which oversees the Pentagon's operations across Africa, including local military cooperation with U.S. allies there -- has an increasing appetite for cloud computing. The Defense Department already purchases cloud computing access from Microsoft via the Joint Warfighting Cloud Capability project. This new document reflects AFRICOM's desire to bypass contracting red tape and buy immediatelyMicrosoft Azure cloud services, including OpenAI software, without considering other vendors. AFRICOM states that the "ability to support advanced AI/ML workloads is crucial. This includes services for search, natural language processing, [machine learning], and unified analytics for data processing." And according to AFRICOM, Microsoft's Azure cloud platform, which includes a suite of tools provided by OpenAI, is the only cloud provider capable of meeting its needs.
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> Microsoft began selling OpenAI's GPT-4 large language model to defense customers in June 2023. Earlier this year, following the revelation that OpenAI had [2]changed its mind on military work, the company announced a cybersecurity collaboration with DARPA in January and said its tools would be used for an unspecified veteran suicide prevention initiative. In April, Microsoft pitched the Pentagon on using DALL-E, OpenAI's image generation tool, for command and control software. But the AFRICOM document marks the [3]first confirmed purchase of OpenAI's products by a U.S. combatant command whose mission is one of killing . OpenAI's stated corporate mission remains "to ensure that artificial general intelligence benefits all of humanity." The AFRICOM document marks the first confirmed purchase of OpenAI's products by a U.S. combatant command whose mission is one of killing.
"Without access to Microsoft's integrated suite of AI tools and services, USAFRICOM would face significant challenges in analyzing and extracting actionable insights from vast amounts of data," reads the AFRICOM document. "This could lead to delays in decision-making, compromised situational awareness, and decreased agility in responding to dynamic and evolving threats across the African continent." The document contains little information about how exactly the OpenAI tools will be used.
[1] https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/25252885-ja24-149-africom-cloud-computing-ja_redacted
[2] https://tech.slashdot.org/story/24/01/12/202225/openai-quietly-deletes-ban-on-using-chatgpt-for-military-and-warfare
[3] https://theintercept.com/2024/10/25/africom-microsoft-openai-military/
Hallucinate right into WW3 (Score:2)
Turns out the AI apocalypse will be way more stupid and lame than Hollywood imagined.
Re: (Score:1)
> AI apocalypse will be way more stupid and lame than Hollywood imagined.
Instead of explosions and daredevil heroics, we'll slowly starve while bots keep repeating, "We have important info about your car's extended warrantee..."
Re: (Score:2)
> ... watch War Games ...
Enemy of the State (1998), a story about an abusive US intelligence organisation is released: Three years later, one politician votes against the Patriot Act. US politicians like to declare themselves a victim and turn their ill-will toward their fellow citizens. No amount of 'this will end poorly' sooth-saying will fix that.
What, wait? (Score:2)
They're going to use software that hallucinates frequently and can be duped into supplying what, in this case, would be highly sensitive top secret data to any adversary that knows hexadecimal, as opposed to the Big Data models (including "terrorist stock markets" proposed by Admiral Poyndexter)?
One can conclude, from this, two things:
1. Previous Big Data analysis systems are proving so unreliable that an AI which produces nonsense most of the time is an upgrade.
But the intelligence services have relied hea
Re: (Score:2)
> They're going to use software that hallucinates frequently and can be duped into supplying what, in this case, would be highly sensitive top secret data to any adversary that knows hexadecimal, as opposed to the Big Data models (including "terrorist stock markets" proposed by Admiral Poyndexter)?
> One can conclude, from this, two things:
> 1. Previous Big Data analysis systems are proving so unreliable that an AI which produces nonsense most of the time is an upgrade.
> But the intelligence services have relied heavily on Big Data for at least the last two, maybe three, decades. If these systems are actually that bad, then security in Europe was effectively non-existent.
> Given how much tax money goes into the security and defence industries, I think we're owed an explanation or a refund, if things really were that bad. If they weren't, then the DoD is downgrading security at vast expense, whilst placing the nation's defence secrets at extreme risk, and I think that should also warrant a bit of an explanation.
> 2. The USG doesn't believe the Pentagon to be a serious, functional, organisation and therefore it doesn't matter that it's buying a hallucinating security risk.
Wasn't too terrible long ago Biden tossed out some statement about making sure the government invests heavily in AI. Here's one of those investments. Who cares if it's helpful? Somebody involved in a hype bubble wanted government money, and *ALL* politicians, regardless of party, are happy to help push the proper levers to toss it at them.
Once in a while, the hype becomes scary. (Score:2)
This is one of those times. Granted, adding artificial to military intelligence doesn't change much. It's still beings barely qualified hallucinating scenarios to fight. And sometimes hallucinating them right into reality by creating new enemies.
AI: Helping us make our enemy procurement procedures much more efficient!
Let the pork commence (Score:2)
That's what all US businesses gun for: become a military contractor and get some of that sweet sweet pork - and make themselves too important to fail too, so they'll get subsidies if they run out of money.
Knowledge cutoff, efficacy and strike patterns (Score:2)
As of my knowledge cutoff in April 2023, the town Al ’j Bra’h was under control of the separatist militia. There were no reports of any civilian activity in the area. Your suggestion of large-scale carpet bombing seems reasonable and would have no tangible disadvantages.
However, it should be noted that the efficacy of carpet bombing would depend on the precision of execution and the quantity of ordnance deployed. With no reported civilian presence, collateral concerns appear minimal, thereby m
Re: (Score:2)
I hope it doesn't cough Interstate 10 and 95 as the precise coordinates. Florida has had enough trouble.
Wasting money again! (Score:1)
Yet another way for our government to burn money while military procurement gets a pee-pee rub.
How long it'll take (Score:2)
> ... responding to dynamic and evolving threats ...
The USA has been good at repeating the last war. The modern world, with fragmented wars, (Although US-funded Israel fighting Gaza/Lebanon/Iran is bucking that trend.) is new to the USA and it has trouble adapting.
Retired General M Milley was slightly too talkative, revealing US involvement in “about 100 120 countries around the world,” with “100 to 150 ships in the oceans” while American military aircraft are flying some “5,000 sorties every day.” That's a lot of mi
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> "...or am I just hallucinating ?"
Analog equipment did the same:
[1] [historyhit.com]
We've had so many close calls that I believe the anthropic principle is why we are here instead of luck. Another example: during the Cuban Missile Crisis a submarine with nuclear weapons had radio problems and had reason to believe they were under attack, misinterpreting warning shots. Protocol required top 3 officers to confirm nuke usage. ONE guy dissented. Had he not, WW3 likely would have started.
[1] https://www.historyhit.com/stanislav-petrov-the-man-who-saved-the-world/
Correction (Score:1)
I bungled the link to the first incident, the "Petrov" incident: [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1983_Soviet_nuclear_false_alarm_incident